


It Would End With Her

by OtoRose



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Affection and Learning Affection, Caretaking, Dysfunctional Family, Gen, Growing Up A Princess, Invisible Words, Other, Politics, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Regicide, Safe For Work
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-17
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-11-15 07:26:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11226156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OtoRose/pseuds/OtoRose
Summary: It's an old fantasy, isn't it? To be a beautiful princess, in a grand gown, in a great palace? It's the stuff many dream of.Many, perhaps, but perhaps not the young princess Camilla.





	1. Chapter 1

Small, slender fingers spent the better part of an hour flitting like butterflies across her face, curving here and there with their implements, landing at moments, a deeply practiced eye judging their results. She tested out expressions in the mirror, smiling brightly, then pouting, attempting to look mature, wondering when, if, she ever would. It was something of a transgression, to wear courtly cosmetics at her age – they were expensive, and Nohr was a country at war.

But her mother loved her enough to permit it.

She unbound her hair, let it fall in a lilac wave of curls behind her. Unmanageable, nearly. It obscured her eyes in a way she hoped might make her look mysterious, someday. Like the ladies at court. Like her mother, with whom they whispered and exchanged glances. She was not permitted on the floor at gatherings; she was strictly forbidden from eating or drinking in such places.

In most places. There was a war.

She eased a stiletto into the garter on her right thigh, concealed by heavy skirts.  Stiff lace made as proper a sheath as any leather, and less noise. Her dress, her boots, her gloves were black, as befitted an unnecessary royal appendage.

She was little more than eight summers old.

When she was found, her dress was ripped, heavy and stiff with blood. The pointed dagger lay stained by her nerveless fingers, her red eyes staring at the paintings hung in the sitting room. She ached everywhere. She would not, could not speak.

She had only done as her mother had told her.

The King had taken mistress after mistress after mistress, after the birth of the Crown Prince, and with his appetite had come forth more than a dozen royal siblings.  In a fit of awful whimsy, he housed those mistresses together in the palace, his affections swaying between them as though he might pick any one to be the next Queen.  And so a war had begun.

It was impossible to ignore the deaths of two princes. But none could blame a young girl for striking out in her own defense – she was still clinging to her mother’s skirts! This was how her mother showed love, after all. And she’d always thought of the King as a good father, and between the two they agreed it would be best if she were sent to the dowager-house for some time, away from the castle and its intrigues and advances and dangers.

Her mother gave her back her knife, and told her not to be afraid to use it. She loved her by giving her the tools she needed. By giving her permission and direction.

The dowager-house had lain empty for decades, and was so far removed from even the severe, if well-appointed, palace - at that time, it was little better than a stable. Earthen floors that turned to mud in the rain, wooden-slat walls that rattled under stiff Nohrian wind. On occasion, servants brought her tidings, clothing, paper, ink, needles and thread from the Castle. And food. And then, as quickly as they came, they left. But she had orders. There was a war. She was not to eat anything her mother did not bring her.

The first week, she ate nothing.

The second week, she began to gather roots from the near-dead ground, and on the third she took her dagger, cut clinging parasite-vines, and caught a rabbit. She would not wait.

After all, the princes, too, had only done as her mother had told them.

There was no safety in war.

When her beautiful, courtly dresses frayed such that she could no longer mend them, she tore them and tied them into pieces less pleasant and more functional. When her body ached with memory, and she forgot herself, she sang to the cold night air. She moved her fingers in mid-air so that they would not numb, as though she were playing the harpsichord.

And for a few summers, she kept herself safe.

She was twelve summers when she wrote her mother, having begged new quills from the servant that visited every two weeks, and told her how she had grown roses, how she could hunt game with her bare hands, how she could climb trees and move in silence, and begged her to bring her home to somewhere she could hear voices. Somewhere she was loved.

She was permitted to return to the palace, eventually, seeming altogether different. She had the focus of a girl with her wits about her once more, one assured of her safety. Gentle fingers, colored with the life and blood restored to them, danced joyful across the keys of a harpsichord.  Her eyes were clear, though a lilac fringe veiled them. But despite her smile, nevertheless her hands remembered all.

Remembered all but, perhaps, her lessons; the reed came down across her neck with a cracking sound when she missed a note under the watchful ears and eyes of her tutor, one of the country’s most respected artists, as well as the beloved of her elder sister. There were days when her whole body remembered, and on those days her shoulders burned red under the hail of corrective strikes. She barely noticed. Her fingers kept moving, even through her mistakes. They never stopped moving.

They never stopped moving, not even when red spilled ‘cross the ivory plane, muscles slowly numbing, opened wide by the sly razors hidden between the keys.

She was twelve summers when they wrapped her hand, and the next day in the public square the axe came down with a loud cracking sound across the neck of her tutor.  Her elder sister, his beloved, followed. She had been kind. She was her favorite.

She was thirteen summers when two more of her brothers died to scouting Pegasi in the war against Hoshido. When she began learning magic.  When the Crown Prince took her to the fields and told her that a Princess of Nohr must understand mounted combat, and trained her against his own hand.

How unafraid he seemed, she thought, of the men on the field with spears. Of the girl who hefted in unfeeling fists an axe as large as she herself. How his sword seemed almost alive as it sang through the air, making art of joyous combat.

Her axe did not sing. Even when she could heft it with one arm, its arc was brutal and efficient, not graceful. Once in motion, it could hardly stop moving, until it found its home with a loud cracking sound, when its art spilled ‘cross its silver plane.

She was thirteen summers when she had mastered magic dark enough to raise a wyvern from death, and to carve obedience into its scales. When one of her younger sisters succumbed to poison at the feast of her ascension.

She was a dutiful daughter. She reported to the King each time. Who had placed the razors. Who had betrayed her brothers. Who had prepared the poisons. Each time, the same person. Each time, he laughed. They had both known who it was; why had he not stopped any of it?

There must be reasons, she thought. There had to be reasons, the Crown Prince agreed. She remembered that he was a good father. That he loved each of his children. That he walked the statuary garden with the Queen, and spoke of nothing but his love for his family.

She was fourteen summers when she began wearing makeup once more. She had learned to think of herself as something of clockwork, when she wore leather to cover fingers burned, scarred, nerveless.  When being weaponry became as easy and natural, moreso than breathing. When she had been pressed into service as one of the ladies at court, one of those she had admired, who looked mature and mysterious. Who listened and spoke, and stole information. Who kept vials in their sleeves and knives against their thighs.

Her gloves fit tight to her hands; she could hold her reins, or a book, or an axe – it was impossible to see that her fingers grasped slow at that which they desired, or that holding a suitor’s hand felt no different from holding her axe, or a tome, or nothing at all. Her lilac-curled hair grew long once more, and she fixed it in place beneath her tiara so that it covered her left eye, because there were scars that even cosmetics could not conceal.

She was fifteen summers when she was second eldest, and only two younger remained, their mothers dead, though by whose hand she would not say, and none ever asked.  She was fifteen summers when the King brought another child into their fold, after so many lost, and shut that one away inside the Northern Fortress.

Her father had taken in a mere foundling! Did he know how she had struggled to secure her place, her life? Her mother’s future, against his brood? Did he know how painful their grudging détente had been, and how she had paid for it?

Could he know what it was like to leave her siblings motherless? What it had taken to appease the power-glutton, so that two of them might yet live?

…did the little one know that the food was not safe? Did she know what had happened to her brothers and her sisters in Castle Krakenburg?

Did she know how to hunt? To keep a stiletto in her garter? To check her servants daily for weapons and wires?

Was this child also to be locked up alone, with no company but the Nohrian chill? Would she, too, be forced to love and fear the nighttime when her specters returned?

A phantom wound ached below her stomach, and in that moment she was upon her wyvern’s back, a bag on her saddle, reins in one hand and axe in the other, and had taken to the skies.

She was fifteen summers when she left her mother’s chambers and swore that she would never pass on the suffering of her war to another. With this girl, she would end it.

The guards at the Northern Fortress gate, above the ravine, told her no-one was to enter, and with a single blow her wyvern sent both tumbling into the fog. A man in the hall with an ice-accent introduced himself as the Princess’s butler, and the silver on her axe gleamed through his chest before he finished his name. There would be nothing overlooked. She would see it through to the end.

***

She was not yet eight summers old when the stranger arrived at the Northern Fortress. Her eyes were wide and vacant as she stared through the stone walls of the sitting-room, focused on nothing. Her fingers curled around empty air. A scene from the past played over in her mind, at once gruesome and terrifying and yet ghostly, details and specifics eluding her memory when she tried to grasp them. She could see blood pooling, a figure falling forward, a hand reaching to grasp her…

“Have you eaten? I brought bread and butter, and I brought milk.” Gloved hands pressed them gently into her own. “They’re safe, dear. See? I’ll take a bite.”

She smelled something warm, something new, that made her stomach growl.  Her eyes resolved on a serene, lilac haired woman in the present, seated just across from her in a chair. She watched the woman break a piece from the loaf, spread the butter – butter? - across it, and eat, a smile on her face. Tenuous, the younger girl started to gnaw on the warm loaf itself. The lilac-haired woman took the loaf, broke another piece off, spread it with butter, and pressed it into her hands.

“Smaller bites are easier. Drink, too. You probably haven’t had anything in a long time, have you?” The woman wiped milk-foam from her upper lip with the back of a gloved hand, and offered the girl the sky-chilled jar. “Safe, just like I promised.”

The girl drank, in silence. She didn’t know about the warnings that lingered on the newcomer’s lips, the pleas for prudence, the many instructions she wanted to give in cosmetics, in weaponry, in etiquette. She only saw her smile, and open her arms, and ask, “What’s your name?”

“C’rin.” She said, through a mouthful of fresh cottage loaf.

“Welcome home, darling Corrin. You are my precious little sister, and I promise always to keep you safe.”

She was not yet eight summers when the words burrowed into her eyes and her throat and her heart like augurs. A pain she’d kept secret even from herself sprung forth, vocal, alarmed, relieved. She barreled forwards, nearly bearing the older girl to the ground with the force of her impact, arms wrapping around her, soaking her dark robes with warm tears, milk spilling across the carpet.

Stiff fingers patted her on her head, stroked her hair, dabbed tears from the corners of her eyes, cradled her close, and slowly, her tears calmed.

***

When the child had cried herself to sleep, she walked the fortress. Smelled the food, took small bites, took inventory, boiled water. The child would require protection. There was a particular cavalier, fifty summers if he was five, disinterested in politics and removed from intrigue – perfect.

More importantly, the chi-Corrin- would need retainers. The King had long required the Ice Tribe provide its people to serve him under threat of war well – when last she had been sent to the village, there were two bright young girls, one playful and tumbling in the snow, one sharp of eye and more practical.

She hesitated. She sought retainers, not…

Playmates. She thought of the Northern Fortress, and its cold, heavy stone walls. Little more than a tower and garrison. Empty. A princess growing up speechless, thoughtless. Cold. Like clockwork, like a weapon…

A small choking sound caught in her throat, and her fingers moved dully against the surface of the wooden larder-table, as though playing a harpsichord.

From the sitting room, a soft, keening sound arose. The red-eyed girl inside had woke, and she was crying. What could she have expected? Sleep does not last long in the young.

A few long minutes later, she sat once more across from the girl. he did not reach for her, did not grasp at her. The child held at herself, arms folded, lip trembling.

“Are you well, little one? Did you get hurt? Did you hurt yourself? It is natural for the frightened to do so, I’ll not be angry.”

The little red-eyed girl shook her head ferociously. “No!”

“I see! That’s very brave. You are safe, here. Are you frightened of someone else?”

“I found a man. Dead, all put in two.”

She nodded, her serene smile never wavering. “Yes, I suppose you must have. I’m sorry for frightening you.”

“You did that?”

“Yes, dear. Come with me, to the kitchen.”

The ritual in Nohr was much simpler than in some parts of Hoshido. Water. Heat. Leaves. Poured into a cup. A tin of biscuits. She was twelve summers when she learned etiquette surrounding it.

“Tea!” Squealed the child, finally at home, wrapping her fingers around the warm ceramic vessel and taking a sip. She had been lifted onto a high stool at the table, and her legs swung carelessly in the air. “It’s sweet?” The girl puzzled, blew on the open liquid, then took another, longer sip. “Why’d you hurt him?”

The woman took the kettle, and her tea, and walked with the child back to the sitting room, and sat in her chair. She had few enough summers to be surprised when the child sat on her lap. “When I was your age, my mother taught me all about love. It meant obedience and faithfulness, no matter what. It meant doing such things for those I loved.” She inclined her head toward the Fortress gate.

“It’s what kept me safe. And I’ll keep you safe, too, because you’re my precious little sister. I’ll stay here with you until your new bodyguard and servants arrive.” The words were halting at first, then found certainty in her voice.  “I’ll do whatever it takes to make you safe and happy.”  

The girl responded “Do I have to do things like-“

“Never. It is the wrong way to love. But it is mine.” She gave the girl’s head a gentle pat, and poured her another cup of tea. “I have one last errand to complete, when I return to the castle, and then nobody will make me kill for love again, now that you’re here.” Her voice wavered; the girl simply sipped her tea and chewed at a tin of elderly biscuits.  “You see what you can do? You’re strong enough to stop it all, just by being here. You could end a war by yourself, if you wanted.”

The girl scowled at the attention being paid to her hair, at first – then laid back, against her big sister’s chest. “Then I want to stop this one. And you can come and stay with me.”

The small body against her. Relying upon her. Trusting her. Believing her. Her heart was in her own throat, and it prevented her speech for several long seconds. This? This is how she could have felt?

She would end it here, and never give her up.

“I will come as often as I can. And I’ll bring other people, good people, with me. And your brothers, and your sister when she’s old enough. They’ll love you, too. And they can’t wait to meet you.”

The girl was not yet eight summers when she finished her tea, and closed her eyes, and felt her big sister’s arms around her, and smiled, succumbing once more to rest.

And with her, a war ended.

For a few summers, at least.


	2. Ghosts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How does one live with such a legacy? With the ghosts, alive and crying in the background, hailing what you've done?
> 
> What makes them go away?

“Am I old enough, yet?”

The lilac-haired princess did not answer; she only sat behind the child, slow fingers slowly twisting the girl’s hair into plaits that pulled tight at her scalp, and pinning the braids in place.. 

“Gunter says I’m ready to go outside.”

The woman carefully pinned a plait up and over the girl’s head, like a white-glowing halo. Patiently she worked with the sharp pins –the girl felt not a single sharp prick. In this warmth, she knew hurt would never be permitted.

“This itches. Must I wear it like this, ‘Milla?” Her little shoulders deserved better than to carry the weight of so many dead.

Camilla placed a hand on the child’s head, to stop her shaking her braids out. “You must. Your younger sister is coming to visit today, for the first time! You must be proud and strong, and be a good example for her.”  We are both responsible for protecting her from what lives inside.

"Can I at least go out to meet her? Gunter said..."

“Gunter is not the one who decides.” She could feel the pressure, hear the voice, just as she could every time she held her most beloved sister.

“We fought, with wooden swords, and he said I was the strongest girl he’d ever seen.”A smoky voice, from so much higher than the princess’s head. “You’re strong enough, now. You’ll need to wear this knife. And you must know how to use it. This is the hearts-vein…”

“Watch carefully.” Camilla turned her head to the young girls attending – one seemed more entranced by the silver and sharp of the pins than by their application. The icy-haired girl, on the other hand, watched keenly, as Camilla pinned the final braid in place. “This is how she will wear her hair tomorrow, when she meets her younger sister. I expect you will not embarrass her.” With just a little strength, it would open, the spray gruesome. "I expect you will not embarrass me when the time comes, tomorrow."

The two girls nodded; the pink-haired one suffered a slip of the hand, and dropped the box of pins, setting the other to her knees picking them up. Corrin started to get up to help – but Camilla’s arms kept her firmly in place on her lap.

“You _are_ the strongest girl he’s ever seen.” Gunter had only seen small adults, never children.  There were never children for long at Castle Krakenberg.

“So I’m ready, then! I’m strong, look!”  The first time she swung her axe, its weight dead and imprecise in her icy, unfeeling hands. Her cousin had designs on King Garon’s throne. 

She bared her paired fangs and raised her hands menacingly. “Like one of your wyverns!” Impermissible.

Camilla only shook her head – a bit condescending. “You are strong, and I love you beyond words, but there is evil outside, and I’ll not let it harm a single perfect hair on your perfect head. I have...”  She misjudged the blade's yaw, and it carved in askew, the haft thudding brutally against maimed flesh, crushing ribs as her strong arms followed through in their horrible work. When the body was found, it was easy to blame the murder on the Fire Tribe; only their Oni used clubs that left such vicious trauma in their wake. It sparked a conflict across the Northwest Border that still raged…

Camilla trailed off, and Corrin turned in her arms, to see what was wrong. Camilla was staring into space, and as Corrin moved against her, Camilla’s hold grew tighter, until it made her ribs ache. “’Milla? It hurts…” She burst into a coughing fit, and Camilla cried out; released her, stroked her head. Felicia dropped the box of pins, scattering them across the floor once more, and took Corrin by her hands in compassion.  It's why she made you. You are no more a mother than she.

“I’m so sorry, little one.” Camilla murmured, when Corrin had her breath back.  You hold her to you, but with what you have done, she's no safer than if she clung to the blade of your axe.

“Another ghost?”

Camilla nodded, her smile sad. “They are stubborn. Almost as stubborn as you, Princess!”  'One of them will make you do it.'

“Why’re you scared of ghosts, sister? You’re never scared of anything.”  'They'll take away the one you love most and they'll use your hands for the deed.'

Corrin knew enough to look away as a tear wound its way down her sister’s cheek, beneath the pretty purple waves. Felicia, however, stared in wonder and curiosity.  The girls are Ice Tribe. They see your scars. They know what you are, what you can do.

“I’m not afraid of anything alive. I’d kill anything for you, darling. And dead things are not fearsome. But ghosts…” Camilla sighed, and placed a gentle kiss on the crown of her sister’s head. “Ghosts live, even though they’re long gone, don’t they? They speak and they act, even if they can never touch you. And sometimes that can be fearful indeed.”  Her hands clenched, she could feel the blood that covered them.

“I can’t see them.”  She must not. She would know. She would fear.

“That’s because they’re _my_ ghosts, darling. They are hard to see. And there’s no magic in the world that sends them away entirely.”  It's Only

The girl sat somber in her sister’s arms, for a long breath. A Matter

“When I grow tall like you, I’ll find a way. I’ll find a way to see your ghosts and send them away for good!” Corrin declared, and she nodded for emphasis.  Of Time.

“Will you, now?” Camilla’s voice sounded odd, for a moment. “Then give me your hand. I’ll squeeze it twice when ghosts are about. Like this…” Camilla’s hands were soft in some places, and tough in others, scratchy-smooth. “And that way, I’ll be less scared, and you’ll know to be careful. And if anyone hurts you, even me, even by accident, you MUST tell Gunter.”  As though Gunter could stop such as she, with book and axe.

“I can do it.” She whispered, smiling in confidence. “I’m strong.”

Camilla finally met her sister’s eyes. “Don’t be.”

Corrin stared. “What?”

“Don’t be strong for me. There will be plenty of time for strong later, when you’re grown. For now, there are baths and songs and visits. You are so strong, but you should not have to be as strong as you are. So no hurrying to be strong.” But she WILL have to be strong. For that day. Just like her sister...

“Yes, ‘Milla.” She frowned, for only a moment. “Can I learn to swordfight? You’re so pretty, but your axe is too big, and I can’t be like you, but maybe Gunter could teach me how to…” Two squeezes, gentle as air, on her hand.

She squeezed back.

“They’re just ghosts, Sister. And I’ll drive them away. You’ll see.”

Camilla’s eyes shone. “Yes. Maybe you will. Now I shall tell you a story about another strong girl, and a wicked witch!”

Corrin pushed down and sat on the floor, alongside Flora and Felicia, and Camilla had got no farther than the nameless princess’s fear of the outdoors when Corrin leaned against her best friend, and rested her head on Felicia’s shoulder, and fell fast asleep.

“Well.” Camilla murmured, lifting the girl gently. “Perhaps the ghost stories can wait, yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again for reading, and I hope you got to see it all! Camilla's relationship with Corrin is something special, and I like to hope that despite the danger, it's therapeutic for them both. Camilla isn't the only one with ghosts, after all.
> 
> PTSD is awful, and it's terrifying, but it's not what makes you who you are. It won't stop love or beauty.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! This is my second formal solo attempt at fanfic, and I very much appreciate your feedback! I cobbled portions together out of background implications and subtext from support conversations, game text, and the Drama CDs, but I'm aware it's not strictly canon. My twitter is @otorosegarden!


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